Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)

As we have had a sort of revisionist presentation from the Minister, I could take him to my county, to Ballyseedy or Beathacha, Caherciveen, or to Countess Bridge in Killarney where 17 prisoners were taken out in one week by the Minister's predecessors, tied to a mine and blown to bits in the name of this State, but I will not go down that road. I am just making the point that in the 1918 to 1923 period there was a war in this State. People were involved in that war on the island of Ireland. The partition of Ireland was agreed by the Minister's predecessors.

We are simply asking that people should be exempt those who were involved in the conflict, who were part of a credible and verifiable ceasefire as part of the Good Friday Agreement, who were imprisoned as a result of that conflict, and were viewed by the British government and the Dublin government at that point in time as special category prisoners. They were brought to special courts and to interrogation centres that were set up especially for people who were involved in the political struggle. Therefore they are absolutely different. The Minister can pick special incidents here and there, and so can I concerning the foundation of his party, but I will not go down that road. We want to amend the legislation so that it does not discriminate against them because of their involvement in the conflict. All we are seeking is that because they were involved in the conflict, they should not be discriminated against. The Minister has an opportunity to send a powerful message to people who have come out of prison after spending long periods there. Deputy Dessie Ellis spent 12 or 13 years in prison and I spent 13 years in prison, although I am no criminal. I was never involved in criminal activity. I know nobody who was in prison with me as a republican prisoner who was involved in criminal activity. I did not want to go to prison or be involved in an armed campaign, but the conditions that were there in my time shaped my future, in the very same way as the future of people born in the Bogside was shaped - those who were 15, 16 or 17 years of age when British paratroopers came in a killed 14 people in 1972. The consequences of repression and a sectarian one-party state created the situation that followed. It was inevitable. In the same way, in the 1918 to 1921 period, the consequences of the brutality of the British presence in this part of the country created the conditions where people - the forefathers of the Minister's party - were involved in terrible things.

We need to work forwards from where we are now. The Minister has an opportunity to try to ensure that we have equality of treatment for people who were caught up in something, not of their own making, but due to the circumstances prevailing on the ground at that point in time. A huge job of work has been done by people like Mr. Martin McGuinness, Mr. Peter Robinson, Dr. Ian Paisley, Mr. avid Trimble, previous governments here, Mr. George Mitchell, President Bill Clinton, Mr. Tony Blair and Mr. Gordon Brown.

However, some of the Minister's commentary is insulting to say the very least. I do not come in here to insult or downgrade him. I ask him, as a legislator, to amend this legislation as part of conflict resolution, advancing the Good Friday Agreement, creating a circumstance, and sending a message out that we have drawn a line in the sand and have moved on from where we were. That is the opportunity that is before the Minister.

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